by Linda Howard
She hadn’t bothered to wrap the towel around herself, using it instead to continue wiping over her hair … slowly. Maddeningly slowly. Her body was bare, fair and smooth and shapely. Frustrated, he had to admit she knew exactly what she was doing to him, and that she was as ruthless in her own way as he was.
“You can help me with that issue, if you will consent,” she said.
“Help you how?” he asked between clenched teeth.
Her hair mostly dry, she shook her head and rubbed the edge of the towel against the place on her neck where one last drop of water trailed down. Down and down, until she stopped it. “I can lay my hands on a being and absorb their knowledge. You have great knowledge of this world. If you allowed me to—”
“No.” Lenna, Strength, poking around in his head? Reading him like a book? Absorbing not just his knowledge of this world, but all his secrets? Not that he had any secrets to speak of, but still … “No.”
She looked peeved. Not angry, just annoyed. She still didn’t cover herself with the towel. “Then I will choose another tomorrow, someone from this world. Perhaps while we are shopping.”
It wasn’t his imagination that she sounded disappointed.
One corner of his mouth lifted in a quirk. After all, negotiation was the name of the game, and he had something she wanted. “What concession will you make if I allow you to read me?”
She stiffened, her blue eyes flashing. “There is no knowledge you could give me that would cause me to turn my back on Elijah.”
No, of course not; she was called Strength for a reason—damn it. She continued in a frosty tone. “If, however, you require sex before you will agree to help him, that is nothing to me and you may relieve yourself with my body.”
He could have her. His penis surged even harder and thicker, urging him to say, Hell, yes, but then, it wasn’t a thinking organ. He liked living on the knife edge of danger and tangling with her in the sheets would be that, and yes, he wanted her, but he didn’t want her as payment. He didn’t want having her to mean nothing to her. Being near her all this interminably long day had worn on his nerves, and this almost made him snap. He was savagely angry that she would even suggest such a thing.
“Thank you, but no,” he said as coldly as she had, and turned his back on her to go into the bedroom, leaving it to her to follow or risk losing the protection of his shielding.
He had turned on one bedside lamp before going into the bathroom, illuminating the bed but casting shadows all around. Lenna dropped her towel on the floor and slipped into bed, making herself comfortable.
Caine ground his teeth. She had insulted him, and he returned the strike. “If I sleep, will you take what you want from me, even though I refused?”
“No.” She looked more than a little pissed by his question; she looked as enraged as he felt. Good. “Don’t be insulting. I would never invade your mind without your permission. That would be rude.”
Caine dropped his towel, walked around the bed, and slid under the covers on the other side. “As insulting as thinking you could buy my cooperation with sex?”
She didn’t reply, and he turned off the lamp.
The darkness was worse than the light. It was more intimate, wrapping them together in night’s cocoon. Darkness was when bodies came together, when barriers were let down. He was in bed with a beautiful woman who obviously didn’t mind being there, who didn’t mind being naked in front of him—but a woman who hadn’t given his erection much more than a glance. What was he thinking? She wasn’t a woman; she was Strength.
But he wanted her. Bad idea.
More than that, for him to succeed in his mission he needed her to function as efficiently as possible in this world she didn’t understand. For that, she needed knowledge. She needed not to be so obviously out of place. She could get that knowledge from someone else. Tomorrow would be soon enough.
“Can you read the kid’s mind?” he asked. “Maybe he knows something about the man who killed his mother that he just doesn’t remember. You could at least figure out what this Uncle Bobby looks like.”
“Elijah is too young, his brain far too fragile.”
Too bad, but … they’d find another way. He turned toward her and moved closer. She was warm, as warm as he was. The comfort of animal warmth shared in the night wasn’t lost on him. Somehow she glowed a little, as if she drew more light to her body than ordinary beings did.
“What else can you do?” he asked. “You never know what might be helpful.”
She lifted a hand, which made the covers fall back from her just enough to reveal her breasts, and created a ball of light that danced on her palm—a light as soft as stars, rather than glaring like sunlight. A soft light. This had to be the magic light Elijah had mentioned earlier.
“Great. You’re a walking flashlight and you can read fully formed minds with a touch. What else?”
The light on her palm died. “My purpose is strength of will and determination. I represent, and share across the worlds, patience and courage. I would think a Hunter would appreciate all of those, though I suspect patience is not one of your personal virtues.”
“No, not really.” He turned the focus back on her. “What about this great temper I’ve heard of? Can you truly wreak havoc when it’s roused? Can you control it?” That would come in handy.
“It’s been thousands of years since I’ve lost my temper,” she said, obviously uncomfortable with the turn in the conversation. “And it’s not something I can control, any more than other beings can control their tempers. It is, as I recall … unpredictable.”
Now it was she who moved closer, turning on her side to face him. Her smallish, exquisitely shaped breasts were just inches from his hand. Perhaps she didn’t notice, but he did; his fingers twitched, and he moved them away from temptation. She said, “Once I was called Fortitude, but over many years that changed, and I became Strength. Even though I was not in the worlds where that shift took place, I, too, was changed. Who I am, what I am, has not faltered.”
“So, you don’t shoot lasers out of your eyeballs.” He barely knew what he was saying, but he was intensely aware of every word she said, every movement she made.
She smiled. “Not to my knowledge. I have never tried to do so.”
“Well, don’t try now.”
She laughed, the sound low so as not to disturb the sleeping child in the next room. He liked laughter on her, better than the annoyance and stubbornness. Vae, he didn’t need to like anything about her.
“It seems that I’m a little faster than the humans of Seven, and a little stronger, too,” she added. “It’s been so long since I’ve ventured beyond my home … so much is uncertain.”
Caine considered all the variables and options, cutting through his innate dislike of leaving himself open to anyone. Nothing she had said swayed him, but he did find himself swayed by what she hadn’t said. Here they were, lying naked in bed together—talking. She was silently offering him more trust than anyone else ever had, in all his travels across the universe. He’d been pissed off at her all day long, and yet now … now he felt the strong impulse to show his trust to her.
Silently he said one of the most pungent curses used on Seven. Ah, well. Might as well get it over with.
“You have my permission.” His voice was low, but the words were clear and laced with steel.
She had evidently dozed off in the few moments that had passed; at least, her eyes had closed. Even a Major Arcana got tired after such a tumultuous day, being jerked from Aeonia into this world, nearly being killed, fighting and running and dealing with being responsible for a child. “What?” she murmured, opening her eyes.
He said roughly, “Touch me.”
Chapter 10
He’d given his permission, but now Lenna hesitated. She knew she needed to read him to acquire crucial information about Seven, but … touching him while they were both naked and in bed was infinitely different from touching him when they were fully clothed
and in Elijah’s company. He was very male and, at least where he was concerned, she was more female than she’d quite realized before. Liking the male sex in general was not the same as being intensely interested in one particular male. She couldn’t remember ever before being aroused by just looking at a man’s body.
Regardless of how uncharacteristically hesitant she felt, she knew she had to do it. Gently she placed one hand on the side of his head, then slid the other to his neck. Her fingers conformed to his shape. Her eyes closed as she cradled him.
He was hotter than she’d expected him to be, turning his hair to warm silk under her hand. His strong neck was hard and corded; she could feel the vibrant rush of blood pulsing deep within. This wasn’t like before. She’d touched him; he’d touched her—but not like this, leisurely, without haste or direction. She liked the sensation of his flesh against her palms, the sound of his breath, the beat of his heart.
Though he had given his permission, finding her way into his mind wasn’t as effortless as reading someone usually was. Everything about him was tough, body and mind. Mentally she pushed, and felt his instinctive resistance.
She took her hands away. “If you hate the idea this much, it won’t work.”
“Shit,” he muttered, a Seven expletive with which she was familiar, having heard it before when she’d looked in on this world. Back then the major mode of transportation had been horses, so even though much time had passed on Seven while she’d been distracted, evidently the expletive was an enduring one.
“Shit,” she repeated, pleased that she both remembered and agreed with the application.
Surprised, he laughed. It was a rusty, stifled sound, one he obviously didn’t make very often. “Making myself mentally available isn’t something I’ve ever done before. Let’s try this.” Before she could ask what “this” was, and agree or disagree, he slid one muscular arm beneath her and rolled her on top of him.
Luckily a fold of the covers got caught between them, or the situation would have been far more intimate than it already was. His big body was hard and vibrant beneath her, her tender nipples nestled against his hairy chest. She took a quick, startled breath, distracted by the rush of pleasure that made her bones turn liquid. She wanted to melt over him, absorb all that strength and intensity inside her, learn about another kind of strength.
He kept that one arm around her, and slipped his other hand up her back to clasp the nape of her neck. “Try again,” he said, his tone so low she could barely hear him.
Once again she cupped the back of his head in her hand, and lightly laid her other hand along his jaw. The roughness of his whiskers scraped her palm. She felt the strong beat of his heart against her breast, his breath against her temple. She closed her eyes, concentrated. She still felt resistance, but this time instead of pushing, she merely let him feel her presence, and after a moment he mentally relaxed and she slipped inside him, to touch not just his thoughts, but his very essence.
Instantly she felt the strength in him. She had known it, of course, but now she felt it.
She hadn’t been certain about Hunters—they were different—but Caine had indeed been a child, long, long ago. He had been born on a world similar to Seven and yet unique, as all the worlds were. As a child Caine had been chosen, he’d been favored, thanks to a genetic quirk a small number of beings from his world possessed. He’d been taken from his family and trained to become what he’d literally been born to be: a Hunter, a mercenary, a weapon.
He was a weapon and a man. Not one or the other, but both.
His fellow Hunters both admired and feared him, and he knew that to be true. His reputation had been honestly earned, with fierceness and his exceptional ability in a race of exceptional soldiers.
Caine was familiar with the details of many worlds, but she pushed past those memories to focus on his vast knowledge of Seven. He had been in and out of the world so many times he didn’t know the precise number of his visits. Over hundreds of years he had seen Seven grow and change. He’d watched, he’d learned, and though he hadn’t been trained to do so, he had enjoyed many of the pleasures here: food, sex, music.
And, oddly enough, thunderstorms. He loved them, as he loved the mountains and the oceans. As he loved to watch the sun rise and set. Through his memories she saw the majestic storms, heard the boom, and felt the power of the wind.
Words flowed into her, as did songs from every age of Seven. Music beautiful and harsh, haunting and exhilarating, soothing and disturbing. Numbers. Science. Languages. He knew them all, and now, so did she. She learned the advances in technology, the customs and manners, the intricacies of everyday life here.
Then the knowledge of Seven passed, and she was elsewhere within his soul.
A small part of her realized that she had everything she needed in order to function in this world and she should immediately end the link and withdraw, but she didn’t. To be inside Caine’s mind was unexpectedly delicious, and she wanted more.
She stilled her body and her own mind. She didn’t probe; she simply waited, and slowly he opened even more to her. This was more intimate than any other connection she had ever experienced. The Hunter was smarter, savvier, more wonderfully layered than he appeared to be at first glance. And still, Elijah befuddled him because, like her, Caine didn’t deal with children, not ever. He barely remembered being a child himself, and as he had been taken from his family so young his childhood and Elijah’s could hardly be compared. Caine hadn’t been coddled; he hadn’t been loved as Elijah had been. No, he had been forged, as any other weapon would be.
Mingled with his irritation and uncustomary confusion, she caught an unexpected—unexpected by her and by him—bit of caring for the child he now protected, as he protected her. Though he put on a show of being gruff and unconcerned, Caine did care.
He cared about doing what was right. He was a man of his word.
If it came to it, she could—and would—leave Elijah in the Hunter’s hands.
She should pull away, end the connection. She knew she should. But now it was as if he held her, as if his mind held hers captive. No, not captive—willingly melded.
She saw that Elijah wasn’t the only one who befuddled Caine. He liked her. He wanted her, so much that feeling the intensity of his need made her tremble. Lying in bed with her was torture for him, and yet because it was his duty to protect her, to shield her from the other Hunters, he remained close. He had studied her in the shower much as she had studied him. He wanted to touch her now, so intensely that his hands ached to stroke her skin. She sensed in great and breathtaking detail what he wanted to do to her.
What she wanted him to do to her.
Her eyes flared open and she found herself drowning in the darkness of his gaze, so close to her, so focused, that she knew he was aware of what she’d been reading and was feeding her more. He shifted beneath her, and the hard rod of his penis pushed upward. She could pull aside the fold of sheet that was between them, open her legs, and he’d be inside her. He wanted it. She wanted it.
And yet … something held her back. He was too much, too male, too alpha, for their personalities to be a comfortable fit. Part of being who she was, was that she could resist temptation.
She severed the mental connection.
She’d gone too far, seen too much. She shook a little as she withdrew her hands and rolled to the side, away from him. Immediately she felt the absence of his heat, wanted anew the feel of his steely body against her. Never before had she delved so deeply into another’s mind; she hadn’t known she could, and likely wouldn’t have if he hadn’t actively pulled her in. He had taken an action of surrender and turned it into a strategic victory for himself.
She had always maintained strict control when reading someone, wary of doing damage with her enormous will. Her invasion into Caine’s essence had taken only a few seconds—hadn’t it?—yet it had seemed much longer. It seemed as if they had lain together like this through the long dark hours of the n
ight. She knew him now. She knew him more intimately than any other being did, or ever had. For a short time, she had been a part of him.
She felt humbled, an unusual emotion for a Major Arcana. Caine was not simply a Hunter; he was a good man. Unlike Nevan, he would never kill an innocent for gain or sport. He experienced emotion in a way she had not, not for a very long time. Pain and joy were as much a part of him as duty.
He wanted her; she wanted him. Those moments when she’d been in his mind had been foreplay, bringing sensations to life as surely as if he’d been kissing and stroking her. They weren’t bound by the human moral restrictions of Seven—restrictions she understood now, as Caine did—so there was no reason for them not to take what they wanted. Just the thought of sex with him caused a tremor, a fire, deep inside her where he would be if she acted on her desire.
“Is everything all right?” he asked.
He knew what he’d done, yet his voice was as impersonal as if they had done no more than shake hands.
Somehow it was important that she meet his strength with her own. Did he think to influence her with sex?
“Yes,” she said, her voice purposely cool. “I’ll be able to function more capably in this world now. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
Had all that been a strategic move to undermine her determination to stay with Elijah? If so, then he would be disappointed. She had touched his soul, but he barely knew her. They were strangers; she was an assignment to him, a mission to be completed.
She didn’t need much sleep, but tonight she would try. She hoped Caine would, too. Sleep would make the night pass more quickly. But first—
“I intend to fulfill my promise to Elijah,” she said into the darkness, “but if I can’t accomplish the task in the days I am allowed in this world, I will trust you to take me home and then return here to see the job done.”
The only hint that the offer surprised him was a very slight lift of one eyebrow. “You trust me.”
